


Beyond the hanging tree

by Grace_d



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types
Genre: Artist!Peeta, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Horror, Lost in the Woods, Modern AU, Octoberlark 2019, Possession, Strangulation, Supernatural Elements, botanist!katniss, gothic horror, the hanging tree song, with a horror twist
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-23
Updated: 2019-10-29
Packaged: 2020-12-30 20:28:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21146123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Grace_d/pseuds/Grace_d
Summary: Peeta stands below a blackened oak tree, head tipped back.He doesn’t turn as I call his name in relief.“Peeta?” I stop just short of his still form.A wind whips through the forest, brushing back the fog, and I see the blackness extends from the trunk of the tree, down along into the ground. The smell of burning is stronger here. I step closer in to Peeta with a shiver.“Katniss. Look.” He says, voice soft.He doesn’t so much as sway, still gazing up, transfixed. From my place just below his shoulder I follow the line of his jaw, the point of his chin and his line of sight.A noose hangs from the lowest branch.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hi all!   
This story was written over 5 days, each part incorporating that days prompts from Octoberlark 2019. Please read the tags and the warnings, and don't read with the lights off! 
> 
> Day 1- “If we go, right now, we should make it to safety.”  
Day 2-“That’s when I hear the scream. So full of fear and pain it ices my blood.”  
Day 3- “I don’t know how I dare say the next words, but I do.”  
Day 4- “A pain stabs my left temple and I press my hand against it.”  
Day 5- “Bad. This is bad. It brings on the flood of images that torments me, awake or asleep.”

1 

Peeta Mellark, I have realised, has the remarkable skill of fitting in anywhere he goes. Even now, mud clinging to his boots, autumn leaves tumbling around him, he looks at ease. Like something from an outdoor sports advertising, wholesome, happy, hair curling sweetly from under his hat and cheeks flushed pink. 

The woods are supposed to be my place. 

Evidently no one told this Town boy that, because despite his lumbering footsteps, he’s taken to this field trip with the same ease I’ve seen him apply to everything else. 

“What?” he asks, and I realise I’ve been staring. 

“You’ve got some dirt on your nose.” I shove the rest of my sandwich into my mouth and look at my own dirty boots, my own dirt caked nails, feeling more like a forest rat than a catalogue model. 

“Oh.” He laughs a little, instead of scowling like I would have, and grabs a cloth from his pocket and wipes his face. 

“It’s probably pastels.” he explains, attempting again to rub at his stained fingers too. 

I hope he doesn’t expect to be too clean for at least another five days, when we head back to civilization. 

“I thought you were using watercolours.” I mumble into my water bottle. 

He looks surprised I’ve even noticed, then goes on to explain how he’s been using a few mediums this trip, and something about capturing movement through speed today, given time restraints of our trek. 

“Would you like to see?” he asks, almost shyly. 

I shrug. I’ve seen some of his work before, it came in as part of his application pack for the paired thesis programs the university runs between the science and arts department. Part of how I have ended up in a backwoods cabin with Peeta Mellark for ten whole days, while he follows along as I traipse through the woods, collecting samples for my own research. 

He flips open one of his notebooks and I can’t help but gasp at the colours. I take the book from him, cradling it in my own lap, and flip through, looking at how he’s captured the quickly changing forest around us. In one picture I recognise my own hands, crusted in dirt and cradling a sample. 

“These are amazing.” I tell him sincerely. 

He makes a noise of dismissal and rubs his hands against his jeans. I continue to flip in silence until I reach a few sketches of the outside of the cabin, a skillet full of cheese damper and two pairs of boots stacked by the log fire. Peeta snatches the sketch book away from then, and attempts to shove a mug at me instead. 

My curiosity is piqued and I protest, making grabby hands at his work. 

He fends me off easily, redirecting me by waving the mug under my nose. The spicy smell of cocoa wafts from it and it works. I grasp it with both hands, wrapping my freezing fingers around it with a happy sigh. 

“And now the magic.” Peeta say with a sly smile and waves his own fingers over my mug. 

Mini marshmallows tumble from his palm into my drink. 

“Thank you.” I say. 

“Got to earn my keep somehow.” he says, dropping a few marshmallows into his own drink. “Or you might find yourself another art student.” 

“Peeta Mellark, I wouldn’t trade you in for the world.” I sigh happily into my hot cocoa. 

I expect a smart comment from him, but none comes. When I peek over my mug he’s looking at me, an inscrutable expression in his eyes. Then he seems to remember himself and laughs. We sip at our drinks slowly for a few moments, listening to the softly dropping leaves in the clearing. There’s a stillness that has blanketed the mountainside, with the crisp still air. 

I realise what I said was true. Despite the fact I’ve only ever spoken a handful of words to Peeta before this, I couldn’t imagine spending this much time in such close proximity to a person that isn’t my sister and enjoying it. But somehow Peeta makes it easy. 

“Hang on.” Peeta says, he reaches over and brushes at my coat. 

“What is it?” 

“Nothing,” he frowns, “just thought I-”. He stops as small grey dots fall on his outstretched hand. 

“Ash?” He asks, and as he says it the strong scent of wood fire flows through the clearing. 

I blink through the sting of smoke in my eyes and take a closer look at his outstretched hand. There shouldn’t be anyone burning fires on this side of the mountain, it’s too remote for most hikers, and hunting is banned in this section. But it is ash, mixed in with snow. 

I tell him as much. 

“This early in the season?” He sounds doubtful. 

I shrug, “Mountain weather.” I start shoving my sample boxes into my pack. “It’s nearly two hours back to the cabin, and I don’t want to get caught out in anything. If we go, right now, we should make it to safety.” 

He follows my lead, scooping up the remainders of our lunch and hoisting his pack onto his shoulders. His pack may as well be filled with feathers, the way he throws it around. He helps me with mine, and we leave the small clearing. 

We head diagonally down the mountain side, slipping on the damn ground cover. A fog steadily creeps in, blurring the forest to shadows. It presses in against us, clinging around our ankles, collecting along our collars. I pick up the pace, determined to make the river before the water level might rise over the rocky natural crossing. I clamber down a small drop, gnarled tree roots overlapping on another where the rock face has eroded away and look back up to help Peeta. 

He’s not there. 

I climb back up the twisted roots. A dark shape looms but as I get closer it’s just a tree. I spin. Around me, there are only ghost trees cloaked in mist. 

“Peeta!” I yell his name into the woods but it drops flat, soaks into the fog. 

Looking down, I only see one set of tracks through the foliage. 

My own. 

I’m alone. 

2 

I spin once again, as though twisting my body again in the fog will bring Peeta back to me. It doesn’t, but the shift in weight on my pack pulls me sideways and I stumble, falling to my side. My hands slap against a tree root. It stings my palms. It grounds me, feels like the only real thing within the creeping greyness. 

I take a steadying breath. 

These are my woods. These are my woods, and my Daddy’s woods. I’m an Everdeen, a hunter and a tracker. What I wouldn’t give for my bow and arrow now. 

I start jogging through the woods, following my own footprints back up the mountain. I yell Peeta’s name. I reach the place our tracks split and follow his much heavier prints to the left, heading almost back up the mountain. 

I’m barely twenty metres from our original path when I come up a copse, new growth springing up from it as though it was recently burnt back. I see murky shapes beyond, and push through. 

Peeta stands below a blackened oak tree, head tipped back. 

He doesn’t turn as I call his name in relief. 

“Peeta?” I stop just short of his still form. 

A wind whips through the forest, brushing back the fog, and I see the blackness extends from the trunk of the tree, down along into the ground. The smell of burning is stronger here. I step closer in to Peeta with a shiver. 

“Katniss. Look.” He says, voice soft. 

He doesn’t so much as sway, still gazing up, transfixed. From my place just below his shoulder I follow the line of his jaw, the point of his chin and his line of sight. 

A noose hangs from the lowest branch. 

“It’s a hanging tree.” I say under my breath. 

The back of my hand brushes along Peeta’s knuckles, and I latch on. 

He startles then, and looks down at me, blue eyes as clear as I’ve ever seen them, wrapping my cold fingers in his own warmer ones. 

“It’s a what?” he asks. 

“A hanging tree.” I repeat and grip his hand tighter. “You know. From the song.” 

“I don’t know that one,” Peeta says, “sing it for me?” 

I glance about the misty circle of trees. There’s something wrong about this place. 

“Maybe some other time.” I tell him. “Come on, we have need to go.” 

I lead him away but his head remains turns upwards again, eyes fixed on the swinging noose, until it is swallowed by the fog. 

I drag Peeta down the mountain, keeping my fingers wound through his. I give his hand a squeeze. Two heartbeats pass before he sluggishly responds. I continue as we descend out of the greyness, to reassure myself he’s still there. As we descend out of the fog Peeta’s responding squeezes come quicker, and he walks faster, matches my stride. 

When we reach the river, he slips in the wet leaf litter and our joined hands drag me down too. We tumble down the embankment, landing in a puff of orange leaves. 

The sun peeks through the heavy clouds. 

Peeta raises his hand to shield his eyes, laughing, and our hands finally release. He helps me to my feet. We hop quickly over the exposed rocks, a sort of elation buoying us along. Giggling like children at our muddy hands and jeans, we tread the well-worn path back to the cabin. The rest of the afternoon is spent sitting together at the picnic bench, me cataloguing plant species, him sketching away. 

The morning feels like a strange dream, and fades into the background of a long day spent hiking and working. At least until I peek over at Peeta’s work, and find his page covered in loosely swinging nooses. He snaps the book shut. 

“Dinner time?” he asks, and his smile is so beautiful in the fading sunset that I smile back on reflex. 

We eat before the wood burning stove, toes warming on the grate, the smell of lamb stew filling the tiny cabin space. Peeta produces a can of cider hidden in the bottom of his pack, and we heat it up before drinking. The tiny bit of alcohol goes straight to my head. We pass our mug back and forth, sharing idle comments about the moon and our favourite music. The firelight bounces off Peeta’s golden eyelashes, deepens his blue eyes. 

I wonder if this friendship with Peeta is some fall magic, or just forced circumstance, if we will get to the trailhead on the tenth day and go our separate ways, never speak to each again. This closeness I feel as our fingers brush might only belong to pine cabins and crackling campfires. It might only belong to me. 

We brush our teeth in the kitchen, the wet area sealed off from the living area in case of foraging wildlife. Peeta hangs back as I slip back into the main room. I know he does this on purpose, waits in the kitchen so I can quickly throw on my sleep shirt and dive into the sleeping bag. He always knocks before he comes back in. 

Five days and we have a routine. 

The fire has dropped to smouldering embers and Peeta sheds his clothing in the near blackness, before slipping into his own sleeping bag at the end of the mats. He’d been surprised, when we’d shown up and there weren’t separate bunks, just a long mat laid on a platform. Enough for five or six campers shoulder to shoulder, gear stashed below. I’d expected him to crack a crude remark about sleeping together. Instead he’d turned to me with an excited smile, and a story about how it reminded him of nap time in the play area of our kindergarten. I had forgotten all about that. He has a remarkable memory. 

I wait. 

“Sleep well Katniss.” He whispers into the dark hesitantly. Just like the four nights beforehand. 

“Goodnight Peeta.” I reply. I almost want to add sweet dreams, but it seems somehow too personal. 

I shuffle around in my sleeping bag, twisting to peer out the window near my end of the mat, my eyelids heavy. I can see a few winking stars. 

I think of the constellations I know, and whispered goodnight wishes, and lovers who meet at midnight. 

Fog curls up against the window, its swirling fingers slipping beneath the lock and pressing against the panes. A golden light bobs up into the window with the surging mist. It calls to me. It knows my name. I slip from my sleeping bag into my boots. 

The light waits, hovering along the tree line into the woods. It bubbles with bright laughter among the creeping shadows. I run to it, and it dances away. I chase the small orb through the forest, sliding in the dirt, roots grabbing at my feet, branches at my sleep shirt. Fog claws down my throat as I gasp, streams out my nose as I pant. The light ducks and weaves, just beyond reach, leading me deeper into the trees. 

Again and again it slips away, but I chase it still. 

Finally it halts, floating in the air, before a blackened oak. 

I stop too, afraid to frighten it, sweat soaking along my body. Gentle strokes of cold run along my cheekbones and around the shell of my ears. The icy touch nips along my collarbones, under my shirt, and my skin sings in response, a heady mix of dread and anticipation. I feel goose bumps spreading across my bare thighs, my stomach, with the sharp lines of cold. 

I step towards the floating light, crooning softly to it. 

I reach out carefully, fingers cupped like a cage. I coax my gold light, my tiny sun, to me with a hum. 

I draw it in, cradle it in against my chest and it blows away the night, like a hot breath against my skin. I feel a responding surge of heat from my own body. It’s not part of me yet, but it should be. 

It will be. 

That’s when I hear the scream. So full of fear and pain it ices my blood. 

I’m sucked backwards and onto the mat with a thud. I throw myself into sitting, dizzy and disorientated, and wrestle myself out of my sleeping bag. 

I gasp at the slap of bitter air against my skin, at the icy stone flooring under my feet. 

Peeta stands at the windowsill, holding a dimmed kerosene lamp aloft. 

He looks out, unmoving, as wind whistles through the cabin, and the scream comes again. 

3 

Now, awake and more aware, I recognise the scream for what it is. Familiar. 

I join Peeta at the open window, wrapping my arms around myself to ward off the chill. 

“I heard her.” Peeta murmurs. “I heard her out there.” 

I peek out into the dim. 

“And she’s caught herself a good meal.” I say, and point to the picnic table. 

A barn owl sits on it, unbothered by our quiet presence. She ducks her head then pulls up, the tendons and sinew of a ferret stretching between her claws and beak, blood glistening black under the moon. 

I’ve skinned animals myself, caught and trapped them, but as the wind brings the sound of gristle snapping into the cabin I shiver. 

I reach up to the windowpane and slide it shut, eager to shut out the night. 

"No don't." Peeta says, his voice is flat. 

"You can bird watch later.” I tell him. 

He doesn't respond, the lantern light flickering dark shadows across his face. His cheeks are slack, and his eyes dark. I realise now he’s shirtless, a light dusting of pale hair across his chest and abdomen, getting darker as it trails lower. I have a second of embarrassment then it’s replaced by concern. His entire body is pebbled with tiny goosebumps. 

“Go back to bed.” 

“I can't,” he says, and there’s nothing in his voice. “I'm waiting.” 

I take the lantern from Peeta’s outstretched arms and raise it higher. Peeta's eyes are empty too, his pupils not even responding to the lamplight. 

He looks blank. 

“What are you waiting for?” I ask with trepidation. 

Peeta’s face changes then, a soft smile pulling at the left corner of his mouth. 

“My huntress.” he says. 

I'm immediately flooded by a bitter pang of jealously. And then more embarrassment. 

I huff a small relieved laugh. 

He's asleep. He’s sleepwalking. And dreaming about a girl. I have no idea what to do in this situation. I try to remember what you are supposed to do with sleepwalkers. I think I’m just supposed to keep him safe, and get him back to bed. 

“Peeta, come away from the window.” I instruct him, and give his arm a gentle prod. 

He feels like ice under my fingertips. 

He doesn't budge either. 

I remember earlier in the day, how he responded better to the touch on the hand. I take him by the hand again. 

“But,” he looks back at the window, “she’s calling me. She's waiting for me at midnight.” 

“Oh brother.” I mumble under my breath as I tug him over to his sleep spot. 

I unzip his sleeping bag and coax him back into it as though he was a small child. His eyes flutter closed again as soon as his head hits the pillow. I draw the sleeping bag up around his shoulders, and give in to the temptation to stroke his cheek lightly. It’s still ice cold. I lean in closer, and can feel even his breath is cool, icy. And yet, he’s not shivering. 

He might be hypothermic. 

I don’t know how I dare say the next words, but I do. 

“Peeta, I’m coming into the sleeping bag with you, is that okay?” 

I don’t expect a response, and I don’t get one. 

I wiggle down into the sleeping bag with him. For a second I don’t know what to do next. Then I reach up and wrap my arms tightly around him, rubbing my hands briskly up and down his back. 

He starts to shiver. 

I’m immensely relieved. 

Then his arms raise and he latches on to me. 

“For medical reasons only.” I say to his stupid sleeping self. 

I tell myself it's better for warming him up anyway when he tucks his head down, nuzzling his cold nose into my neck. He sighs, and it almost sounds like my name. 

“You better not still be dreaming about your mystery girl.” I tell him as I continue to rub my hands up and down his back in slow circles. “If I get a present meant for her it’s going to get incredibly awkward between us tomorrow.” 

My hands run up and across his back, and as his shivers settle my hands gentle. He feels warm and heavy in my arms. I should get out, now that he seems okay, but it’s nice in the sleeping bag, wrapped up together. 

It feels safe. 

Peeta hums sleepily against my neck, a series of soft notes, and I feel warmth spread from where his lips touch my neck. 

One night should be alright, I think as my eyes slip shut. 

As I slip off to sleep, deliciously warm in Peeta's arms, I recognise the song he's humming. 

It's the hanging tree. 

4 

When I wake the next morning it’s to rain against the cabin roof. For a moment I drowse, push my face into the sleeping bag and reaching out for Peeta. 

I jerk awake when my arms reach out and find nothing. 

The cabin is dark, darker than it should be, with rain streaming down the window panes and the dampness just creeping in on my exposed arms. I can hear small clatters from the kitchen area. I drop back in relief just as Peeta cracks the door open. 

I watch quietly as he manoeuvres the door with his foot, balancing the tea towel wrapped pan and two mugs in his hands. He’s dressed now, a red Henley layered under flannel but still in his sweatpants. His face is flushed pink, the edges of his curls wet, as though he’s just scrubbed it clean in the sink. He’s so extraordinarily focused on being quiet that he doesn’t even notice me until he’s practically alongside the sleep mat. 

“Oh,” he freezes when our eyes meet, and his own drop quickly away, “You’re awake.” 

I shrug awkwardly. 

“I made skillet bread.” He offers, and pulls over a stool to set it down. 

Peeta perches on the end of the sleeping mat. I sit up, crossing my legs and tucking the sleeping bag around me. 

“Are you cold?” Peeta asks, looking at the floor. “I can relight the fire, or like, step out so you can get dressed.” 

“This is fine.” I say, and take a chipped white and blue enamel mug from his hand. 

More hot chocolate. 

I can’t believe he lugged all this stuff into the mountains, and I tell him as much as he carefully unwraps the skillet, releasing a puff of cinnamon perfume into the air. 

“What do you normally eat out here?” he asks. 

“Gale and I normally just scull trail mix and dehydrated packs while we’re on a hunt, or eat what we catch.” 

I try the bread. It’s incredible, and I can’t stop my small noise of appreciation. I almost miss Peeta’s small “right” underneath it. He’s still looking at the ground, the grate of the stove, the window. Anywhere but me. 

“I think we should talk about the sleeping bag.” Peeta says, face still turned away from me. 

I shove some more cinnamon bread into my mouth and grunt. Personally I’d rather rip out my own tongue then have this uncomfortable conversation, but he should have told me about it before. What if he had’ve wandered out into the night in his sleepwear? 

Peeta rubs his hands against his thighs. 

“I just want you to know I didn’t touch you or anything, not on purpose. And if I had’ve woken up, I would’ve moved. I didn’t know you were there, and I didn’t take advantage or anything.” 

The rain starts to hammer down, beating in waves against the panels of the roof, and I can barely catch Peeta’s stammering words. He doesn’t have to act so mortified about the thought of touching me. I’m not completely disgusting. 

“Peeta,” I interrupt his cringing apology, “it was fine. Let’s just ignore it.” 

“I don’t know if I can do that.” He says. “I think, it means something different to you than me-” 

Peeta Mellark is rejecting me, I realise through as he searches for words. 

“and I thought you should know how I feel-” 

I cut him off, recalling my jealousy from the night before at Peeta’s dreams of some girl outside the window. 

“I already know about your crush.” I say bluntly. 

“You do?” 

“Yeah and I don’t really care.” I say shortly, still stinging and keen to get this conversation over and done with. “I just felt bad for you.” 

“Oh.” His face falls. “That’s what that was, pity?” 

“Yes.” I say, and pull the sleeping bag up higher around me. “Now if you don’t mind, I need to put some pants on.” 

Peeta’s face twists, drops into something vulnerable and childlike, then it hardens, tightens across his jaw and shoulders. 

He goes into the kitchen, slamming the door shut behind him. 

I yank my clothes on fast, adding extra layers to combat the damp air. I’m leaning in the stove, stoking the fire high, when he comes back into the main room. He sits quietly at the booth seat in the corner, lights the kerosene lamp and pulls out his sketchbook. He begins drawing in silence, running a stick of charcoal across the page in quick, jerky motions. 

I pull out my samples, lay them in order on the floor, and begin cataloguing them. I’m desperate to reclaim the easy cadence of our previous days of work, but I can’t think of a single thing to say, to disrupt the furious energy of Peeta’s scribbles. So I start humming, idly at first, becoming more and more absorbed in it and my work until I realise I’m singing the Valley song quietly. 

Peeta’s staring at me. 

“You’re a real piece of work, you know that?” He says to me. 

I stop humming. 

The rain turns to storming, with lightning and thunder that shakes the window panes. Peeta becomes increasingly distressed, flinching with each lightning strike. The fire burns brighter in the stove, filling the room with suffocating heat. The cabin becomes claustrophobic. Another clap of thunder and Peeta actually whines, high in the back of his throat. 

I go to the table, try to lay my hand on his exposed forearm, try to comfort him. 

He jerks his arm away. 

“Are you okay?” I ask. 

He doesn’t answer, just curls in on himself, huddling over his sketchbook. 

I stare at the redness extending along the crest of his cheekbones and nose. Sweat mixes with the charcoal streaking his face. 

I wonder if he’s sick, he looks half delirious. 

I pack my samples away, deciding to prop open the door, let the cool in for a second. 

The front step is smeared in blood. 

The dead ferret from last night sits there, white ribs flayed beneath matted hunks of fur and gore. 

I shudder, but kneel down, grabbing the body by the scruff of its mostly intact neck. I bring the carcass into the living room and close the door behind me. 

Peeta gasps. 

He's staring at me again, eyes fever bright. 

"I’m just going to dispose of it." I tell him gently. “Or it might attract more predators." 

I let myself into the kitchen, taking the lantern with me. The kitchen area is blessedly cool, condensation gathering on the window panes and metal benches. I wrap the ferret's body and place it in a sealed bucket. I’ll bury it away from the cabin when the weather turns. 

As if my thoughts have caused it, the rain starts to temper, the storm moving further up the mountain. 

I move to the sink, scrubbing the blood from my hands. Out the window, I can see the thin silhouettes of the trees, the muted orange of the leaves. I stare into the grey as I wash my hands. 

Lightning flashes and I see something move in the treeline. 

Thunder rumbles in the distance. 

One of the shadows separates from the others. 

My hands burn with an icy sting, then turn numb, as the water runs over them. 

The shadow drifts closer to the cabin by slow degrees, inch by inch, becoming larger, darker, more solid. 

I raise a shaking hand to the window pane, and wipe away the thin film of condensation. 

A wild face snarls through the window, silver eyes flash, teeth snap. 

I throw myself away from the bench and the face is gone. 

I grab my hunting knife off the counter, my fingers so cold they can barely grip the handle. I take a single deep breath and unsheathe it, the blade glinting in the lamplight. I go back to the window but there’s nothing there but the trees. 

I lock the window. I lock the back door, and fumble it, dropping the knife, then curse and try again. I sweep up the knife and the lantern, tucking the knife into my belt and run into the living room, slamming and locking the kitchen door behind me. 

The living area is empty. 

The front door is open, mist seeping in. 

Peeta’s coat still hangs from the hook above his pack, his boots by the fire. 

His notebook lies abandoned on the floor. 

More numb than anything, I cross the room and pick it up. It falls open to a page, me braiding my hair, a close study of my hands. I flip through, my hands again, fingers intertwined with Peeta’s, fingers curled up on a pillow, palms wrapped around a mug. The sketches start to change, the charcoal coating the page in thick stripes. 

My hands cradling a small pile of berries. My hands wrapped around the hilt of a wicked hunting knife. My hands twisting a noose of thick rope. My hands, covered in gore and gristle from the ferret, snapping joints. My nails carving bloody symbols onto Peeta’s forearm. 

I drop the sketchbook. 

It lands open on the last page, wild slashes of charcoal, and it’s the tree, the hanging tree, reaching out of the book, branches twisted and gnarled. 

I run to the doorway and see the tracks he’s left, heavy brown footprints soaked through the leaf litter and into the wet ground. I grab Peeta’s coat off the hook, stuff it and his boots into my pack. I shove on my own boots. I take the kerosene lantern, and my unsheathed knife, holding it at ready by my side. 

Peeta has a head start, but I’m faster. 

I catch him by the river. Yesterday’s smooth flowing water is savage now, swelling against the banks, water rioting over the rocks. Peeta walks down the embankment, bare feet sucking in the mud. 

I advance carefully, calling his name. 

“Let me go.” He says. “I have to meet her.” 

He steps into the surging water, either unknowing or uncaring at the bitter cold swirling around his ankles. 

I drop the lantern and dart forwards, hauling him backwards. 

“Peeta stop.” I grunt as he struggles. “There’s no one there.” 

“She told me you’d lie to me.” He kicks like a wild thing. “She said you’d try to trick me. Let me go!” 

“Peeta there’s no one there!” I cry again and try to hang on to him. 

I drop the knife and kick it away as he swings his arms and grabs a hold of my braid, pulling on it hard. 

“Liar!” he yells. “Murderer!” 

And then I hear it, the voice, so familiar, calling to him. Singing for him. The tone is low and clear, like bells. 

She sings the hanging tree song. 

I drag Peeta onto the embankment. 

A shadowy figure stands on the other side, beckoning. 

“Get off me mutt.” 

Peeta surges suddenly, shoving back against me hard. I stumble, and slip on the wet rocks. He falls back onto top of me. With a wheeze I let him go. He rolls away. Stunned, I curl onto my side and watch as he stands and wades into the fast-flowing water. 

It’s a girl who waits for Peeta. A girl with a long dark hair, and silver eyes. 

A pain stabs my left temple and I press my hand against it. My fingers come away, smeared with blood. 

The girl smiles at me, as Peeta struggles over to her side, but it’s feral, all sharp teeth and wolfish eyes. 

I’m seeing things. 

Because the girl on the other side of the river is me. 

5 

I watch in horror as Peeta pushes through the flooded river, eagerly wading into my double’s arms. She stands patiently, arms extended, her dirty white shift floating about her. Even through my disorientation I can make out her sharp cheekbones, the fullness in her bottom lip, the burn mark rippling on her left forearm. 

It’s all mine. 

It is me. 

Peeta reaches the other side and he stumbles onto the bank. 

It laughs, the girl with my face, but I can’t hear it over the rushing of the river and the pounding of my own heart. It pulls him upright, threads her thin fingers through his, and leads him up into the foliage on the other side. 

Before they disappear into the fog and the trees, it pauses, matted hair flowing loose. 

She looks back. 

She raises their joined hands to show me, to mock me, and places a kiss on the back of Peeta’s hand. 

“Mine.” It mouths, with my lips, then pulls Peeta forwards. 

I follow the shine of Peeta’s ashy gold hair as far into the trees as I can, before they’re gone from sight completely. 

I take a second, lean hard against my elbow in the mud as blood trails down my face and drips off my chin onto my hand. 

I have nothing. No explanation, no comprehension of what is happening. 

Why does that thing have my face? 

I push myself up, feeling the pack jostle on my back. I drop it off, wrapping a hand across my chest. I can feel my ribs bruising already. The knife lies in the mud, the lantern shattered beyond that. Peeta’s footprints sink deep into the mud and I want to cry. 

I give myself simple instructions. 

Katniss, arm yourself. 

I can’t take the heavy bag across the water with me, if I fall it may drown me. I pull Peeta’s coat from the pack, stuff a pair of socks I find inside his boots into my pocket. At the bottom of the pack I find an emergency trail kit, and I take some gauze from it, the emergency blanket and a flint. I also take my scalpel. I stash them in my pocket. I unwind the kerosene can from the lantern and put it inside my coat. 

Katniss, take off your boots. 

I smother my own sobs while I sit in the mud to unlace my boots and roll up my pants. 

Peeta’s coat smells like cinnamon and dill. 

He’s out there with a thing that wears my face, wears my body. 

He might be dead already. 

Katniss, move. 

I walk up the river bank to the narrowest point, the stones we skipped across yesterday invisible under the eddies and white swirls of the angry water. I wade into it. It feels like a million knifes through my skin. I get to the other embankment, shivering and soaked to the waist, and put my boots back on. 

I grip the compass in my hand, press the gauze against my bleeding head and drop my chin, eyes trained on Peeta’s heavy footprints disappearing into the woods. I start jogging. 

I don’t know how long I run up the mountain for, the thick fog making time and place irrelevant. I only care about each step I take that doesn’t reveal Peeta to me. My head spins from the insanity. 

The fog lights up with lightning, burning the whole woods white like a flash bomb. I see the copse of burnt undergrowth straight ahead. Thunder follows instantaneously, as though the strike was overhead. The acid taste of ozone scalds in my throat. 

I sink low, and creep up on the clearing. 

The fog is lighter here, pushing up against some unseen barrier around the circle of trees, surrounding the hanging tree. 

Peeta’s there, pinning the thing up against the blackened tree, gripping her hips. Her shift rides up under his hands, and her dark legs are wrapped around his waist, head tilted as Peeta kisses along her neck. It looks so much like me, head thrown back. I can feel its breathy sighs in my own throat. 

He groans my name. 

I decide if we survive this, I may kill him myself. 

Silently I shed Peeta’s coat, and then my own. I tuck my hair into my collar. I push the box cutter into my boot, keeping my hunting knife in my right hand. 

The thing threads one hand through his hair and stretches the other above her, sliding her palm up the tree trunk, knocking soot loose onto their heads. Peeta turns his face, looking up, and she pushes him back, forcing his face back into her neck. 

“Just like that.” She whispers, and with her raised hand she pulls a loosened noose down from the branch. 

Peeta tries to lean back again and she grips him harder, arching against him and digs her fingers into the back of his neck. 

“Not like that.” It coos, “like this.” 

I circle the clearing, hidden on the edge of the fog, trying to see an advantage. I don’t like the way her nails dig into Peeta’s skin, the eerie still that hangs heavy in the air around her. But I don’t want to hurt Peeta, and they’re tangled in together. 

It drops the noose down over his neck, turning his head this way and that, whispering things into his ear as it does. 

I run forward while she’s distracted, knife raised. I cover the distance in a single instant, intent on the rope. 

The creature reaches out to the side and catches my wrist in her hand. 

I push against it, lean into my arm. She doesn’t even flex against my weight. She smirks, an expression I’ve never seen in my own face. 

“Persistent, aren’t you.” she says. 

She looks down at Peeta, his face still buried in her neck, brushing her nose against his ear. 

“Be still.” She hisses into his ear and he freezes. 

“Let him go.” I grunt and try to pull away. 

She idly strokes the curls at the back of his neck. Then she darts her tongue out, and licks his ear, tightening her fingers around my wrist as she does. She readjusts her legs, taunting me, slowly stretching and recrossing them one over the other around Peeta’s hips. 

I drop the knife from my hand, catch it in my other one, and drive it into her side. 

She howls with rage, and the noise sends my vision into blur, splitting my head open with the force of it. I clamp my hands over my ears and drop to the ground. 

Beside me, Peeta does the same, but he gags as the noose pulls tight against his neck. 

The thing struggles to its feet, my face slipping from its skull for a moment. With a grunt, it slides the knife from its stomach. Black ash leaks out from the cut, falling with a hiss onto the ground. 

It pulls my face back, stretching her jaw. 

Then she slams into me, straddling my shoulders, pinning me to the ground with her knees. She twists the knife in her hand. 

But she doesn’t just kill me. 

She stares down at me, almost curious, with my own eyes, but I can see where my face doesn’t fit right, the hollowness below the cheeks, the sinking gums. The eyes fit just right though. 

I look away and to where Peeta kneels, frozen in horror staring at the two of us. Our eyes lock and he’s present, panicking. Eyes so blue. 

“Don’t look at him.” She hisses, and presses down hard through my shoulders. 

She flings a careless hand towards Peeta and the rope begins slowly winding back up the tree, wrapping around the branch, once, twice, spiralling around the bough and pulling tight. Peeta struggles to his feet, dragged up by his neck. 

I kick up against her but she’s too heavy, too strong. She barely shifts as I wiggle hard, bringing my heels up underneath me and bucking with all my strength. 

She leans in close, matted hair falling about us. Her breath smells like burning woodfires. She scrubs some dried blood from my temple with her thumb. 

“Such a pretty face.” She hums, and it doesn’t sound like me anymore. It sounds like wind whistling between the tree. “I’m happy to take it off you.” 

She lifts the knife and trails it down my face, gliding over the curve of my cheek, running it under the bottom of my jaw. As if it’s planning the neatest way to skin me. That’s exactly what it’s doing, I realise. 

I try to bite it. 

She grabs my hair and pushes my head back into the mud. 

“Let’s start with your lips.” She says, and digs the knife into the bow of my lip. I taste fresh blood. “He likes these.” 

I push again, and this time, I brush my heel against my hands, trapped down by my side. I remember the box cutter. I work it from my sock, gripping it tight and extending the blade. I feel my fingers slice where it catches, but my arms are still pinned. 

Behind it, I hear Peeta choke. See his feet, extended onto his toes, swinging as he tries to keep his feet on the ground. 

“I like you,” she says, “I like your body. I like your boy. I’ve been waiting for so long for one just like him. All pent up with years and years of longing.” 

“Get your own painter, tree bitch.” I gather the blood in my mouth and spit it at her. 

She just laughs. 

“Don’t worry, you’ll get plenty of time in your precious woods now. Laying, waiting for your own chance. For some sweet innocent that you can claim.” 

She wipes my blood from her face, then leans in and kisses me soundly. 

I grab her lip in my teeth, ripping at the flesh. She tastes like dirt in my mouth and I bite harder, as soot and ash drifts onto my face, down my throat. 

She screeches and pulls away, face ripping. I swing wildly with the box cutter, slashing her face, her raised hands. I get her in the throat and she collapses, grey ash seeping from the wound. 

I kick her hard, and it’s like kicking a bag of sand. 

I cough, choking on the charcoal. 

I stagger to my feet, hobble to where Peeta hangs, his feet meekly twitching and useless now. I cut him free and he drops into my arms. I stagger under his weight, and half lower, half drop him to the ground. I slide off the noose with shaking hands, bright red bruising blooming across his neck and collarbones. 

I run my fingertips across it, feel for his pulse. 

His heart beats. 

I cry in relief, pressing a hard kiss against his slack mouth. Then I collapse beside him, dizzy and still coughing puffs of ash. The last thing I remember is a cool grey moth landing on my outstretched arm. 

* * *

“I dreamt there were two of you.” Peeta says, leaning against the doorframe, the moonlight in the room creating a white gold halo around his head. “And then I woke and it was real.” 

Bad. This is bad. It brings on the flood of images that torments me, awake or asleep. 

Dragging the girl’s body to the tree, face torn, soaking it and the tree in kerosene, lighting them up. Peeta had screamed bloody murder as the tree burnt, and I had dragged him away, through the woods, back to the cabin, coughing up ash all the while. 

The marks didn’t fade from his neck for months, but his memories of the events disappeared the moment we left the trailhead. 

I wish mine would do the same. 

Peeta laughs and comes into the room to kiss me. His mouth is soft and eager, chasing my lips then trailing down my neck, and reminds me why we got in this mess in the first place. My stomach flutters. 

He feels it too, and kneels before me, pressing my white nightdress tight across my stomach. 

“Hey little arrowhead.” He coos to my stomach, and the thing inside me kicks heartily, “you’re going to be a wild girl like your mama right? Going to have her eyes and her scowl.” 

“Peeta.” I grip under his chin and tilt it back, so I can see his eyes, “I am never sharing you with a silver eyed creature again.” 

His brow creases for a moment and I run my fingers against his forehead, smoothing out the creases. 

“You hear that baby?” I say, “you better be a towheaded boy, or I’ll leave you in the forest.” 

Peeta laughs, and stands to press another kiss against my lips. 

“Wild thing.” He says. 

I send him back to bed with a promise to follow soon. 

I stand in the dark, hands resting either side of my stomach. I look up at the moon, and our creation kicks again. 

It’s always restless at this time of night. 

“It’s okay little one.” I hum and rub my hand over my stomach. 

I rock from side to side, and sing a lullaby to slow its rolling. 

_“Strange things did happen here, no stranger it would be,_

_If we met at midnight, in the hanging tree.”_

The End


	2. After

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just in case any of your were wondering how Peeta was doing?

Somewhere in the house comes a soft thud, and I snap awake. I’m attuned to waking, within a second now, to mewls and whimpers and wailing. 

“Is that you Katniss?” I call into the dark room. 

No response comes, and I throw back the blanket, holding my breath in an effort to listen harder. The clock ticks over to midnight. I feel my way down the hall, padding through the shadows in the hall. The nursery door is open. 

From it I hear strains of a song, a haunting tune I don’t recognise, an edge in the low tone. 

“Katniss?” I whisper and slowly nudge open the door. 

A figure stands in the corner, white gown flimsy in the moonlight, dark hair straggling down as they reach down into the crib. Their head comes up with a hiss. 

Black eye sockets, silver eyes filled with ash, a glimpse of white cheekbone and the copper smell of blood. 

I stagger back, hit the wall. 

Fingernails in my shoulder, rotting breath in my mouth, something tight around my neck and I’m choking, gasping and wheezing, and she’s waiting for me, waiting for me to join her, but it’s not her face waiting for me to come into the dark, my eyes burn and she’s going to win, she’s waiting for me to sift myself into ash and she’ll paint it on her face and fill my empty skin back up with it- 

“Peeta!” My eyes fly open at my name. 

I’m on the floor in the hallway, Katniss leaning over me, running her fingers over my face. 

“Where is she?” I push her away. 

The thought of her fingers on my skin makes me shake. 

“Who?” Katniss asks, and crawls closer to me on her hands and knees. 

I scuttle back. 

“I remember- You-“ I gasp out the words like I’m still choking. 

“Hey,” she coos, like she might to a frightened animal, “hey, hey.” 

What do I remember? 

She starts to hum, and touches her fingertip against my wrist. 

I try to think, the woman in the trees- Katniss slides her fingers up my arm -her face- there was something wrong, it didn’t- Katniss’s fingers trace small circles- Something else touches my hair- a different time- Katniss climbs onto my lap. 

She brushes the hair off my forehead then laces her fingers behind my neck. 

“Oh.” I say in surprise. “We’re on the floor.” 

“We are.” she acknowledges. 

“Was that you or me?” 

I look around. In the dim I can see the photo frames above us are knocked about, the door to the nursery is open. I drop my hands to rest on Katniss’s hips, and some absent part of me crawls at the contact. The window at the end of the hallway is open. 

I don’t remember getting out of bed. 

“Hey.” Katniss gets my attention again. 

“Sorry.” I laugh a little at myself, at the feeling that disturbs me from somewhere out of reach. “Weird dream I think.” 

She lets go of my neck with one hand, and sweeps her hair back off her shoulder. I play with the strap of her nightgown, distracted from my slippery thoughts by her body. It feels so familiar. 

I lean in and press a kiss into her exposed neck. 

Her skin is freezing cold. 

“It wasn’t real,” she sighs and I wrap my arms around her to warm her up, “it wasn’t real.” 

As I run my nose along her soft skin, breathing in her woodfire scent, I wonder what she’s talking about.

**Author's Note:**

> Wow, this was a big departure from my usual style but I hope you found it spooky enough! 
> 
> As noted above, it was written pretty quickly, so would I like to give it a thorough line edit? yes. Would I like to explore different themes and turn it into a multi chapter? also yes.   
Will I do either of those things? Most likely no. 
> 
> But thanks for reading along, and I hope you enjoyed (if that is the right word)


End file.
